Congressional Record: July 17, 2003 (Senate)
Page S9580-S9581
Amendment No. 1277
Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Illinois [Mr. Durbin] proposes an
amendment numbered 1277.
Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading
of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
(Purpose: To limit the availability of funds for the Intelligence
Community Management Account pending a report on the development and
use of intelligence relating to Iraq and Operation Iraqi Freedom)
Insert after section 8123 the following:
Sec. 8124. (a) Limitation on Availability of Certain
Funds.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, of the
amount appropriated by title VII of the Act under the heading
``Intelligence Community Management Account'', $50,000,000
may only be obligated after the President submits to the
appropriate committees of Congress a report on the role of
Executive branch policymakers in the development and use of
intelligence relating to Iraq and Operation Iraqi Freedom,
including intelligence on--
(1) the possession by Iraq of chemical, biological, and
nuclear weapons, and the locations of such weapons;
(2) the links of the former Iraq regime to Al Qaeda;
(3) the attempts of Iraq to acquire uranium from Africa;
(4) the attempts of Iraq to procure aluminum tubes for the
development of nuclear weapons;
(5) the possession by Iraq of mobile laboratories for the
production of weapons of mass destruction;
(6) the possession by Iraq of delivery systems for weapons
of mass destruction; and
(7) any other matters that bear on the imminence of the
threat from Iraq to the national security of the United
States.
(b) Additional Matters on Uranium Claim.--The report on the
matters specified in subsection (a)(3) shall also include
information on which personnel of the Executive Office of the
President, including the staff of the National Security
Council, were involved in preparing, vetting, and approving,
in consultation with the intelligence community, the
statement contained in the 2003 State of the Union address of
the President on the efforts of Iraq to obtain uranium from
Africa, including the roles such personnel played in the
drafting and ultimate approval of the statement, the full
range of responses such personnel received from the
intelligence community, and which personnel ultimately
approved the statement.
(c) Appropriate Committees of Congress Defined.--In this
section, the term ``appropriate committees of Congress''
means--
(1) the Committees on Appropriations, Armed Services, and
Foreign Relations and the Select Committee on Intelligence of
the Senate; and
(2) the Committees on Appropriations, Armed Services, and
International Relations and the Permanent Select Committee on
Intelligence of the House of Representatives.
Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, yesterday as a member of the Senate
Intelligence Committee, I sat through a 5-hour hearing with the
Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Mr. George Tenet. It was
one of the longest hearings I have ever been a party to in that
committee. Virtually every member of the committee was present for the
entire hearing. I think we can accurately draw the conclusion from that
that it was a hearing of great importance because it addressed an issue
which is central to our foreign policy and our national security, and
that is the intelligence agencies of our Government.
We are asking now some very difficult but important questions along
two lines. First, was the intelligence gathered before the United
States invasion of Iraq accurate and complete? Secondly, was that
information relayed and communicated to the American people in an
honest and accurate fashion? Those are two separate questions that are
related.
Yesterday, Director Tenet reiterated publicly what he has said before
on July 11, that he accepted responsibility for the fact that in the
President's State of the Union Address last January a sentence was
included which was at best misleading. The sentence, of
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course, related to whether or not Iraq had attempted to obtain uranium
from the African nation of Niger. What I am about to say is not from
the hearing yesterday but rather from public disclosures and press
reports relative to that issue.
What we know is this: The allegations and rumors about Iraq obtaining
uranium and other fissile materials from the country of Niger had been
discussed at some length for a long period of time. In fact, documents
had been produced at one point that some believed implicated the Iraqis
and the Niger nation in this particular transaction. It is also true,
though, that the people who are expert in this area had looked
carefully and closely at that documentation and many had come to the
opposite conclusion. Some had concluded this information, whether it
was from British intelligence sources or American intelligence sources,
was dubious, was not credible. Then it was disclosed that the
documentation was actually a forgery.
Many of those documents have been made public. Yesterday a leading
newspaper in Italy published the documentation and it was reported on
the news channels last night in the United States that when those
documents were carefully reviewed, it was found that, in fact, they
contained things which on their face were ridiculous, names of
ministers in Iraq and Niger who had not been in that position for
years, supposedly official seals on documentation which, when examined
closely, turned out to be patently false and phony.
So it was with that backdrop that the President, in his State of the
Union Address, considered a statement concerning whether or not Niger
had sold these fissile materials to Iraq.
It has been disclosed publicly and can be discussed openly on the
Senate floor that there was communication between the Central
Intelligence Agency and the White House on this issue. It is apparent
now to those who have followed this story that there was a discussion
and an agreement as to what would be included in the speech. The 16
famous words relative to this transaction have now become central in
our discussion about the gathering and use of intelligence.
What I heard yesterday during the course of 5 hours with Director
Tenet is that we have been asking the wrong question. The question we
have been asking for some period of time now since this came to light
was, Why didn't Director Tenet at the CIA stop those who were trying to
put misleading information in the President's State of the Union
Address? That is an important question. Director Tenet has accepted
responsibility for not stopping the insertion of those words. But after
yesterday's hearing and some reflection, a more important question is
before the Senate. That question is this: Who are the people in the
White House who are so determined to include this misleading
information in the State of the Union Address and why are they still
there?
That goes to the heart of the question, not just on the gathering of
intelligence but the use of the intelligence by the Executive Office of
the President. That is an important question. It is a question we
should face head on.
An attempt was made last night by my colleague from New Jersey,
Senator Corzine, to call for a bipartisan commission, a balanced
commission, to look into this question about intelligence gathering and
the use of the intelligence leading up to the war on Iraq. His
amendment was defeated by a vote of 51 to 45 on a party-line vote--all
Republicans voting against it; all Democrats supporting it. Senator
Corzine's effort for a bipartisan, balanced, evenhanded commission was
rejected by this Senate.
The amendment which I bring today offers to the Senate an
alternative. If the Senate does not believe there should be a
bipartisan commission to investigate this question, this use of
intelligence, then what I have said in this amendment is that we are
calling on the President to report to Congress, the appropriate
committees in the classified and unclassified fashion, whether or not
there was a misuse of intelligence leading up to the war on Iraq. Those
are the only two options before the Senate.
In this situation, we have the Intelligence Committee in the House
and the Senate looking at the classified aspect of this issue. We have
said in the Senate that we do not accept the idea--at least, the
Republican side does not accept the idea--of a bipartisan commission
looking at this issue. So, clearly, the responsibility falls on the
shoulders of the President.
This amendment says that the President will report to the appropriate
committees of Congress on this use of the intelligence information.
Why is this an important discussion? It is particularly important
from several angles. First, if we are engaged successfully in a war on
terrorism, one of the greatest weapons in our arsenal will be
intelligence. We will have to depend on our intelligence agencies to
anticipate problems and threats to the United States. We will have to
gather credible information, process that information, determine its
credibility, determine its authenticity, and use it in defense of the
United States. Now, more than ever, intelligence gathering is
absolutely essential for America's national security.
Second, the President has said we are now following a policy of
preemption; we will no longer wait until a country poses an imminent
threat to the United States or our security. If the President and his
administration believe a country may pose such a threat in the future,
the President has said we are going to protect our right to attack that
country to forestall any invasion or attack on the United States.
How do you reach the conclusion that another country is preparing to
attack? Clearly, again, by intelligence gathering. Now, more than ever,
in the war on terrorism and the use of a policy of preemption, we
depend on intelligence. Those are the two central points.
Equally, if not more important, is what happened in the lead-up to
the invasion of Iraq. For months, the President, the Vice President,
and his Cabinet all sought to convince the American people this
invasion of Iraq was not only inevitable but was, frankly, in the best
interests of America's national security. The administration, the
President, gathering the intelligence data, presented it to the
American people in a variety of different fashions. We can all recall
how this started. It was almost a year ago that in Crawford, TX, we
first heard the President while he was in summer retreat suggest that
something had to be done about Iraq and used the words ``regime
change.''
Then, over the months that followed, a variety of different
rationales came forward for the need to invade Iraq and remove Saddam
Hussein. First and foremost--and nobody argued this point on either
side of the aisle--Saddam Hussein was a very bad leader, not just for
the people of Iraq but for the region and a threat to the world. His
removal from power from the beginning was certainly something that
everyone understood would be in the best interest of the people of
Iraq.
But the obvious question was, if you are going to set out just to
remove bad leaders of the world, where would you draw the line and what
would those leaders do in response? So the administration said there
are more arguments, even more compelling rationales.
First and foremost, in Iraq they were developing nuclear weapons. We
recall that conversation. As evidence of that, administration officials
talked about the fact that Iraq had obtained certain aluminum tubes
that could likely be used for the development of new nuclear weapons.
Now, in fact, we know on reflection that there was even a debate
within the administration whether these aluminum tubes could be used
for nuclear weapons. Despite that, the administration said
categorically, we believe they will be used for nuclear weapons and we
believe that is a rationale for the invasion.
Second, on other weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological
weapons, the administration went so far in its presentation to suggest
that there were 550 sites where there was at least some possibility of
weapons of mass destruction. They went into detail about how these
weapons could threaten Israel, could threaten other countries in the
region, might even threaten the United States. That information was
given repeatedly.
The fact is, we are 10 weeks after the successful completion of our
military
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invasion of Iraq. More than 1,000 inspections have been made in Iraq.
No weapons of mass destruction have been found. There has been some
small evidence related to the discovery of something buried in a rose
garden that could have been a plan for the use of a nuclear device.
There has been the discovery of these mobile units in trailers which
might have been used for the development of biological weapons. Those
things have been discovered but of the so-called 550 sites, the fact is
we have not discovered or uncovered one as I stand here today.
I am confident before this is over that we will find some evidence of
weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. It could happen as soon as
tomorrow. I think that will happen. I believe that will happen. But we
were told we were dealing with 550 sites. Statements were made by the
President, the Vice President, Ms. Condoleezza Rice and others, that
Saddam Hussein had arsenals of chemical and biological weapons. They
have not been apparent.
To think in that lightning-fast conquest of Baghdad, somehow Saddam
Hussein had the time to literally wipe away or destroy any evidence of
weapons of mass destruction strains credulity.
What we have now is a serious question as to whether the intelligence
was valid and accurate or whether it was portrayed to the American
people in a valid and accurate way.
We also had allegations that Saddam Hussein was linked with al-Qaida.
Of course, this is something of great concern to the American people.
We know that the al-Qaida terrorists are responsible for September 11,
the loss of at least 3,000 innocent American lives on that tragic day.
We would and should do what we can in any way, shape, or form to
eliminate al-Qaida's threat to terrorism. I joined the overwhelming
majority of the Senate, giving the President the authority and power to
move forward on this question as to whether or not we should eliminate
al-Qaida and its terrorist threat. The fact is, now, as we reflect on
that information provided by the administration prior to the invasion
of Iraq, there is scant information and scant evidence to link Saddam
Hussein and al-Qaida.
The list goes on. It has raised serious questions about the
intelligence gathering leading up to the invasion of Iraq and the
portrayal of that information to the American people. There is nothing
more sacred or important in this country than that we have trust in our
leaders when it comes to the critical questions of national security.
When a President of the United States, with all of his power and all of
his authority, stands before the American people and says: I am asking
you to provide me your sons, your daughters, your husbands, your wives,
your loved ones, to stand in defense of America--that, I think, is the
most solemn moment of a Presidency. That is what is being questioned
now. Was the information, for example, in the State of the Union
Address, accurate in terms of America's intelligence? Two weeks ago the
President conceded at least that sentence was not.
What I have asked for in this amendment is that the Bush White House
come forward with information on the gathering and use of this
intelligence. With this information, they will be able to tell us with
more detail exactly how the intelligence was used, intelligence related
to the possession by Iraq of chemical and biological and nuclear
weapons and locations, the links of the former Iraqi regime to al-
Qaida, the attempts of Iraq to acquire uranium from Africa, the
attempts of Iraq to procure aluminum tubes for the development of
nuclear weapons, the possession by Iraq of mobile laboratories for the
production of weapons of mass destruction, and the possession by Iraq
of delivery systems for weapons of mass destruction, and any other
matters that bear on the imminence of the threat from Iraq to the
national security of the United States.
I go into particular detail in paragraph B of this amendment where it
relates to the acquisition of uranium from Africa because I think this
has become abundantly clear. Some person or persons in the White House
were bound and determined to include language in the President's State
of the Union Address which was misleading, language which the President
has disavowed, language which in fact Director Tenet said should never
have been included.
When you look at the uranium claims that were made in the President's
State of the Union Address, and then read the statements made
afterwards by members of the Bush White House, we can see on their face
that we need to know more. Bush Communications Director Dan Bartlett,
discussing the State of the Union Address, said last week that:
There was no debate or questions with regard to that line
when it was signed off on.
I will tell you point blank that is not factual, based on statements
made by Director Tenet.
On Friday, July 11 of this year, National Security Adviser
Condoleezza Rice said there was ``discussion on that specific sentence
so that it reflected better what the CIA thought.''
Miss Rice said, ``Some specifics about amount and place were taken
out.''
Director Tenet said Friday that CIA officials objected and ``the
language was changed.''
White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said Monday, July 14, that
Miss Rice was not referring to the State of the Union speech, but she
was, instead, referring to President Bush's October speech given in
Cincinnati--even though Miss Rice was not asked about that speech.
We have a situation here where the President and his advisers and
speech writers were forewarned in October not to include in a speech in
Cincinnati any reference to the acquisition of uranium by Iraq from the
nation of Niger or from Africa. That admonition was given to a member
of the White House staff and that element was deleted from the
President's speech.
Now we have statements from the President's National Security Adviser
suggesting that there was still some discussion that needed to take
place when it came to the State of the Union Address. I will tell you
that is not a fact. This amendment which I am offering is asking that
we have final clarity on exactly what happened in the White House on
this critical piece of information that was part of the President's
most important speech of the year, his State of the Union Address.
White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer also said on Monday, July
14, that while the line cut from the October speech in Cincinnati was
based on Niger allegations, the State of the Union claim was based on
``additional reporting from the CIA, separate and apart from Niger,
naming other countries where they believed it was possible that Saddam
was seeking uranium.''
But Fleischer's words yesterday contradicted his assertion a week
earlier that the State of the Union charge was ``based and predicated
on the yellowcake from Niger.''
Consider the confusion and distortions which we have already received
from this administration about that line in the speech, and what it was
referring to. That is a clear indication that more information is
needed, more clarity is needed. We need from the President leadership
in clearing this up and, frankly, clearing out those individuals who
attempted to mislead him in his State of the Union Address.
Miss Rice was asked a month ago about the President's State of the
Union uranium claim on ABC's ``This Week,'' and here is what she
replied:
The intelligence community did not know at the time or at
levels that got to us that there was serious questions about
this report.
But senior administration officials acknowledged over the weekend
that Director Tenet argued personally to White House officials,
including Deputy National Security Adviser, Stephen Hadley, who is in
the office of Condoleezza Rice, that the allegations should not be used
in the October Cincinnati speech, 4 months before the State of the
Union Address.
CIA officials raised doubts about the Niger claims, as Director Tenet
outlined on July 11, last Friday. The last time was when ``CIA
officials reviewing the draft remarks'' of the State of the Union
``raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the
intelligence with National Security Council colleagues.''
Here is what it comes down to. We now have a battle ongoing within
the administration over the issue of gathering and use of intelligence.
The American people deserve more. They
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deserve clarity. They deserve the President's disclosure. They deserve
the dismissal of those responsible for putting this misleading language
in the President's State of the Union Address. I think what is at stake
is more than a little political embarrassment which this administration
has faced over the last several days. What is at stake is the gathering
and use of intelligence for the security of the United States of
America.
This issue demonstrates the administration's intelligence-derived
assertions about Iraq's levels of weapons of mass destruction-related
activities raised increased concern about the integrity and use of
intelligence and literally the credibility of our Government.
We now know that when Secretary Colin Powell, the Secretary of State,
was to make his address to the United Nations several days after the
President's State of the Union Address, he sat down and, it has been
reported in U.S. News and World Report, for a lengthy gathering with
Director Tenet at CIA headquarters and went through point by point by
point to make certain that he would not say anything in New York at the
United Nations which could be easily rebutted by the Iraqis. Secretary
Powell wanted to be careful that every word that he used in New York
was defensible. And one of the first things he tossed out was that
element of the President's State of the Union Address which related to
acquiring uranium from Africa.
Secretary Powell took the time and, with the right advisers, reached
the right conclusion that certain things being said about Iraq that
were being hyped and spun and exaggerated could not be defended. And he
was not about to go before the United Nations Security Council and to
use that information. He was careful in what he did because he knew
what was at stake was not only his personal credibility but the
credibility of the United States. That is why this incident involving
the State of the Union Address is so important for us to look into.
On the question of weapons of mass destruction, on August 26 of last
year, Vice President Cheney said:
Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now
has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is
amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies,
and against us.
On September 26, 2002, the President said:
The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons.
On March 17, 2003, President Bush told the Nation:
Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves
no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and
conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.
On March 30, 2003, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, said:
We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit
and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat.
Not only did the administration tell us that there were over 500
suspected sites Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was even specific as to their
location.
Here we are 10 weeks later and 1,000 inspections later with no
evidence of those weapons of mass destruction.
On the al-Qaida connection, last year Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld described evidence about a connection between Iraq and al-
Qaida as ``bulletproof.'' But he did not disclose that the intelligence
community was, in fact, uncertain about the nature and extent of these
ties.
In his speech before the United Nations Security Council on February
5, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell said, in addition to the al-
Qaida-affiliated camp run by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in areas not
controlled by the Iraqi regime, two dozen extremists from al-Qaida-
affiliated organizations were operating freely in Baghdad.
The claim of a close connection between the Iraqi regime and al-Qaida
was key to the fears that Iraq could team up with terrorists to
perpetrate another devastating attack on the United States. It is
critical that the truth of these assertions be examined in light of
what the United States has found during and after the war.
On the issue of reconstituting its nuclear weapons program in
addition to the dispute about whether Iraq was trying to acquire
uranium from Africa, the intelligence community was divided about these
aluminum tubes that Iraq purchased and whether they were, in fact,
intended to develop nuclear devices or only conventional munitions.
Administration officials made numerous statements, nevertheless,
expressing certainty that these tubes were for a nuclear weapons
program.
In a speech before the United Nations General Assembly on December
12, 2003, the President said,
Iraq has made several attempts to buy high-strength
aluminum tubes used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon.
On September 8, 2000, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said
on CNN's ``Late Edition'' that the tubes ``are only really suited for
nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs.''
On August 26, Vice President Dick Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign
Wars that ``many of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire nuclear
weapons fairly soon. Just how soon we cannot gauge.''
On March 16, the Vice President said:
We believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.
Consider these assertions and these statements leading up to our
decision to invade. The hard question which has to be asked is whether
the intelligence supported the statements. If the intelligence did not,
then in fact we have exaggerated misleading statements which have to be
made part of our record.
On the question of mobile biological warfare laboratories, Secretary
of State Powell said in his speech to the United Nations Security
Council that ``we know that Iraq has at least seven of these mobile,
biological agent factories.''
On May 28, 2003, the CIA posted on its Web site a document it
prepared with the Defense Intelligence Agency entitled ``Iraqi Mobile
Biological Warfare Agent Production Plants.'' This report concluded
that the two trailers found in Iraq were for biological warfare agent
production, even though other experts and members of the intelligence
community disagreed with that conclusion, or believe there is not
enough evidence to back it up. None of these alternative views were
posted on the CIA's Web page.
Did this Nation go to war based on flawed, incomplete, exaggerated,
or misused intelligence?
I am a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which
is conducting this review. I support that review because there is a lot
we need to get into. We have oversight responsibilities over the
intelligence agencies.
I commend our Chairman, Senator Roberts, and our ranking member,
Senator Rockefeller, on that committee. They have requested that the
Inspectors General of the Department of State and the Central
Intelligence Committee work jointly to investigate the handling and
characterization of the underlying documentation behind the President's
statement in the State of the Union Address. I certainly support that
investigation.
But the question of how intelligence related to Iraq was used by
policymakers is a different question that simply must be determined.
What we are saying now is if the Senate, as it did last night,
rejects the idea of a bipartisan commission to look into the question,
at the very least we should say in this Department of Defense
appropriations bill that the President has a responsibility to report
to Congress on this use of intelligence and information. It really goes
to the heart of the President's responsibility as the head of our
country and as Commander in Chief. He needs to have people near and
around him giving him the very best advice based on the best
intelligence. It is not only good for his administration, but it is
essential for the protection of this Nation.
I yield the floor.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, before the Senator leaves, I wish to
say categorically that had I been the Vice President of the United
States, based upon the intelligence briefings that I have participated
in now for over 20 years, I would have made exactly the same statements
the Vice President made.
I believe sincerely that the record of history shows clearly that
Iraq has tried to acquire and did acquire nuclear capability in the
past. The Israelis destroyed it once. We know he was trying again to
reestablish them.
There is no question that he had weapons of mass destruction. He used
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them on the Iranians. He used them on the Kurds. Gas is a weapon of
mass destruction.
There is also no question at all that he had the vehicles to
transport weapons of mass destruction. Why did he build the vehicles if
he didn't have them?
This nit-picking at the language that was used--it was used, we now
know, in error in terms of veracity as far as the reliance upon the
concept of what the British had because it was later disclosed that one
of the things they had was a forged document. Why did the United
Nations, 17 times, ask to examine that country to find the weapons of
mass destruction if the world did not believe he was after weapons of
mass destruction, after he used them on the Iranians more than 15 years
ago? They bombed the plant that absolutely had the reactor in it. And
we knew he had weapons then.
I have to say that when we look at what has happened, when our troops
went into those barracks after the war commenced, they found that the
Iraqis had special masks to protect them against weapons of mass
destruction. We don't have those kinds of weapons.
The Senator is a member of the Intelligence Committee. I am reliably
informed that at a classified session yesterday he asked CIA Director
George Tenet the very questions which he has asked on the floor, and he
received the answers. Some of the Members don't like the answers, but
they received them. Had Director Tenet took responsibility for a
mistake in his agency--clearly he had problems about the way that
document was handled and in terms of the speech.
This is the third time this has come up now on this bill. This
amendment would fence the Community Management Agency of the CIA, one
of the most important and vital works of the agency. It would take $50
million from them.
I am not going to do it now, but sometime in the future I am going to
ask the Senator whether he believes that he never had weapons of mass
destruction. Does he believe Iraq never had weapons of mass
destruction? Does he believe there was no reason to go in there and do
what we did?
The problem is this amendment standing alone would deny the following
programs funding:
Assistant Director of the CIA to allocate their collection efforts
against terrorists and other high-priority target activities. This is
their central community program.
Talking about the intelligence community, one of them is the National
Drug Intelligence Center's Analysis of Information for
Narcotraffickers--a vital concept that deals with counterterrorism
activities.
The second is the National Counterintelligence Oversight Analysis
Assessment of Vulnerabilities to Foreign Intelligence Services.
The next is efforts to improve the intelligence community's expertise
in foreign languages.
This was identified as the key unmet need by the joint inquiry that
investigated the 9/11 activities.
Each of those programs is essential to our national security.
In order to make his point on this concept, the Senator again seeks
to fence off $50 million for those vital activities. I hope the Senate
listens to us about what he is willing to do in order to make this
statement again.
I shall move to table this amendment. But, again, I have been asked
this question many times personally at home by the press and by family
friends. Some of us are exposed to intelligence at a very high level of
Government. We can't come out and talk about it.
I noticed in the paper yesterday that some of our people because of
this issue are starting to ``lip off'' about intelligence matters that
should be classified. The Senate and the Congress should come back to
order on that. We are allowed access to classified information--and to
have us, because of some question about one phrase in the President's
speech, suddenly decide that classification means nothing, is wrong,
and it is not in the best interest of the United States.
Now, Senator Inouye and I have been involved in extremely classified
information for years. As a matter of fact, at our request, there was
what we call a ``tank'' built in our building so we could have those
people come visit us and we would not have to go out and visit the CIA
or the other intelligence agencies. And we do listen to them.
Based on everything I have heard--everything I have heard; and the
two of us have shared the chairmanship of the Defense Appropriations
Subcommittee, which is defense intelligence related, since 1981--
everything I have heard convinces me, without question, that Iraq tried
to develop a program of weapons of mass destruction, and did, in fact,
have weapons of mass destruction. And we were justified--just as the
Israelis were over 15 years ago when they went in and bombed one
plant--we were justified to go in and just absolutely disestablish that
administration because it had rebuked the U.N. 17 times in terms of the
attempt to locate those weapons of mass destruction and to do what
Saddam Hussein agreed he would do after the Persian Gulf war. He agreed
to destroy them. He admitted he had them. He agreed to destroy them.
And we tried to prove he destroyed them. Now, what is all this question
about whether he had them? Because he admitted he had them.
It is time we settle down and get back to the business of providing
the money for the men and women in uniform around the world, and to
ensure that the people who conduct our intelligence activities have the
money to do what they have to do.
The extended debate on this floor about intelligence activities
because of that one 17- or 16-word--I don't remember--the small phrase
in the President's State of the Union message is starting to really
have an impact on the intelligence-collecting activities of this
country. We do not want to besmirch that. We have the finest
intelligence service in the world. If someone made a mistake--and now
it has been admitted there was a mistake; not in whether or not he was
trying to put together his nuclear weapons program--the mistake was in
reference to what the British did have; and it was later found that the
foundation for what the British thought they had was a forged document.
Intelligence is absolutely essential to a nation that bases its
capability to maintain peace on force projection, and we have to rely
on many people to provide us information. Human beings make mistakes.
God forbid that anyone would ever say because of one mistake we should
harness the core efforts of our intelligence efforts and deny them the
money this bill has for them to proceed until this commission, which
the Senator wants to create, reports. I cannot believe we would delay
the release of these funds for those reasons.
The ongoing efforts of the Intelligence Committee are known. The
Senator is a member of the Intelligence Committee. We who are members
of the Subcommittee on Defense Appropriations have access to everything
they have access to, because we manage the money that finances the
agencies they investigate. So there is a whole series of us here who
have access to extremely classified information.
We classify it primarily because there are so many people involved
that many lives might be in jeopardy if we disclose the sources of that
information or we disclose the impact of that information in terms of
the relationship to some of the programs we are funding today.
I urge the Senate to settle down. I urge the Senate to settle down.
We do not need this continued debate about the words in that State of
the Union message. That is history, and it is going to be examined in
terms of politics in the future.
Now we had arranged the schedule this morning so we could conduct our
business and still start the markup of four separate appropriations
bills. I must be absent now as chairman of the committee for a period
of time.
I move to table the Senator's amendment, and I ask unanimous consent
that the vote on that occur at a time to be determined by the majority
leader after consultation with the minority leader. At the time of the
stacking of votes on this and other amendments, I shall seek approval
for a recorded vote on this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. DAYTON. Madam President, reserving the right to object, I ask
what the Senator's intention is regarding the schedule right now after
the Senator concludes his remarks?
[[Page S9525]]
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I have a motion to table. Has the
motion to table been accepted by the Chair?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has a unanimous consent request.
Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the time
for that vote be determined by the majority leader after consultation
with the minority leader.
Mr. REID. Madam President, I reserve the right to object. The Senator
from Illinois is also a member of the Appropriations Committee, but he
wants to have an opportunity to respond.
Mr. DURBIN. I do.
Mr. REID. He can do it any way he chooses. We are not going to have a
vote right away, so he can attempt to have the floor. I wonder if the
Senator from Alaska would--we have no right to object in any way to the
motion to table, but the Senator from Illinois has more to say.
Mr. STEVENS. I have no objection if the Senator wishes to respond. I
wish to get my motion to table on the record, and I am happy for the
Senator to speak after that motion in relationship to the amendment. I
have no problem with that. I just want to get my part of this business
done so I can go chair that committee markup.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The motion to table is pending.
Mr. STEVENS. Is there an objection to my request that the motion to
table vote be postponed until a time certain to be determined by the
majority leader after consultation with the minority leader?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. STEVENS. I am prepared to yield the floor, and you can talk as
much as you want.
Mr. REID. Has the unanimous consent request been agreed to?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. No, it has not.
Without objection, it is so ordered. The request is agreed to.
Mr. REID. Madam President, before the distinguished chairman of the
Appropriations Committee leaves the floor, the Senator from Minnesota
asked a question: What are we going to do now? We have a number of
amendments lined up. We are not going to do those because the two
managers of this bill are members, of course, of the Appropriations
Committee, as are Senator Durbin and myself.
Mr. STEVENS. Will the Senator yield?
I would be prepared to make a request that after Senator Durbin makes
his remarks there be a period for morning business during which the
Senator from North Dakota may be able to speak for up to 30 minutes on
a matter not related to this bill.
Mr. REID. Reserving the right to object, the Senator from Wyoming
wishes to speak for 10 minutes, I am told, on the bill itself.
Is that right?
Mr. THOMAS. Yes. I was going to follow up on what has been said.
Mr. REID. The Senator from North Dakota has no objection to him going
first, he being the Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. STEVENS. That is fine.
Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from
Wyoming have 10 minutes to speak on the bill, and following that time,
the Senator from North Dakota have 30 minutes as in morning business,
and following that the Senator from----
Mr. DAYTON. Minnesota.
Mr. STEVENS. Minnesota.
Mr. DAYTON. I would like to speak on Senator Durbin's amendment. I
would agree to 5 minutes.
Mr. STEVENS. Could it be that we agree to 30 minutes of debate
pertaining to matters relating to this amendment, notwithstanding the
motion to table has been made? Is that agreeable? That will give us
enough time to get back.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. REID. Also, Mr. President, if I could, Senator Kennedy is going
to be here at around 11 o'clock. Of course, that has slipped.
Mr. STEVENS. It is roughly 11 o'clock.
Mr. REID. He will offer the next amendment. Perhaps then Senator Byrd
will. Really, we are narrowing the number of amendments that are going
to be offered.
Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I don't know what the Senate would do
without the assistance of the distinguished Democratic whip. We have in
history Light Horse Harry, and this is our ``Heavy Horse'' Harry. He
does the heavy work around here, and we all appreciate him.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, pursuant to the unanimous consent
agreement, I can assure my colleagues I will not take 30 minutes. I
will be extremely brief because I already stated my case in support of
this amendment. But I would like to respond to the Senator from Alaska.
He and I have had some titanic struggles on this floor over a variety
of issues, but I have the highest regard and respect for him
personally. I am certain he did not mean to suggest nor did he say I
have disclosed any classified information in my statement this morning.
I would not do that, not knowingly. What I have disclosed to the
Senate, in preparation for a vote on this amendment, has all been a
matter of public record and published information.
There are many other things I have learned as a member of the Senate
Intelligence Committee to which I can't make reference, because it is
classified and very important, that remain classified. But I don't know
which bill you would go to if you didn't go to the Defense Department
bill to deal with questions of intelligence. It is one of the few, if
only, bills coming before the Senate relating to intelligence
gathering. We don't have a full blown discussion here about
appropriations for the Central Intelligence Agency and all the
intelligence aspects of the Federal Government. It is a carefully
guarded secret of our Government as to how much is being spent and how
it is spent. Many people have objected to that over the years. I
understand their objections. I also understand the wisdom that we try
to keep in confidence exactly what we are doing to gather information
to protect America. About the only place where we openly discuss the
funding of intelligence is in this bill. If you don't come to this
floor on this bill to suggest that we can do a better job in gathering
intelligence to protect America, then, frankly, there is no other
appropriations bill to which you can turn.
I assume you might argue that the Department of Homeland Security,
our new Department, has some aspects of intelligence. Maybe that
argument can be made. But the most compelling argument is on this bill,
the Department of Defense bill. That is why this amendment is not
superfluous or out of line. This is where the amendment needs to be
offered because what we are saying is, America is only as safe as the
men and women who are protecting it, men and women who are in uniform,
literally putting their lives on the line, and men and women working
for our Government gathering information so that we can anticipate
threats and make certain we protect the people.
What I have said in this amendment is we, clearly, know now that in
the President's State of the Union Address statements were made which
the President has disavowed as not being accurate and which the
Director of the Central Intelligence Agency has said should not have
been included because they were misleading. That is a critical element.
We gather across this Rotunda in the House of Representatives once a
year, the combined membership of the House and the Senate, the Cabinet,
the Supreme Court, the diplomatic corps, to hear the President deliver
the State of the Union Address. It is his most important speech of the
year. He outlines to the people the accomplishments of our Nation and
the challenges we face.
This President came before us last January in an atmosphere leading
up to an invasion of Iraq, a war. I don't think there is any more
serious undertaking by a government than to say we are going to war. We
are asking our citizens to put their lives on the line for the security
of America. The President came to the people with that message.
We now know that at least one major part of that message--they say it
is only 16 words but it was a major part of his message--was not
accurate.
Do I think the President intentionally misled the American people?
[[Page S9526]]
There is no evidence of that whatsoever. I have not heard a single
person say he intentionally misled the American people in making that
statement. But I will tell you this, there were people in that White
House who should have known better. They had been warned 4 months
before not to use the same reference in a speech the President was
giving in Cincinnati. They had been told by the CIA that
the information was not credible, could not be believed, should not be
stated by the President of the United States, and that section was
removed from the President's speech in October.
Those same people in the White House, bound and determined to put
that language in the President's State of the Union Address, put in
misleading language which attributed this information not to our
intelligence, because our intelligence had disavowed it, discredited
it, said we can't believe it.
No, they attributed it to British intelligence. Our people believed
the British intelligence had been wrong from the start and yet we
allowed that to be included in the speech.
Across America and around the world, people heard our President say
that Iraq was acquiring uranium--or attempting to--from Niger in Africa
to develop nuclear weapons. That is a serious charge. It is as serious
as any charge that has been made against Saddam Hussein's regime.
Someone in the White House decided they would cut a corner and allow
the President to say this by putting in that phrase ``based on British
intelligence.''
I would think the President would be angered over the disservice done
to him by members of his staff. I would think the President would
acknowledge the fact that even if Director Tenet could not discourage
that member of the White House staff and stop them from putting in that
language, the President has within his ranks on his staff some person
who was willing to spin and hype and exaggerate and cut corners on the
most important speech the President delivers in any given year.
That is inexcusable. This amendment says that this President will
report to Congress on exactly what happened in reference to that State
of the Union Address, that finally we will know the names of the people
involved, that they will be held accountable for this misconduct which
has caused such embarrassment, not just to the President, not just to
his party, but to our Nation.
We need to be credible in the eyes of the world. When statements such
as the one made by the President are clearly disavowed by the
President, it affects our credibility.
Last night we tried to create an independent bipartisan commission to
look into this question in an honest fashion. It was rejected on a
party-line vote with every Republican voting against it.
Now I have taken the second option. Now we call on the President
himself. Harry Truman from Independence, MO, used to say ``the buck
stops here,'' when it comes to the President. The buck has stopped on
the President's desk. The question is, What will he do to establish his
credibility, to make certain that the next State of the Union Address
is one that is credible in the United States and around the world and
to make sure those people who misused the power of their office to lead
him to make those misleading statements are removed once and for all?
It is a painful chapter in American history but it is one we cannot
avoid. So long as it is unresolved, there will be a shadow over the
intelligence gathering and use of this administration. That is not in
the best interest of national security. It is not in the best interest
of the people.
We in Congress have our responsibility, as a coequal branch of
Government, to enforce oversight and to make certain that the American
people are well served.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. DAYTON. Following the custom of alternating back and forth, I am
prepared to defer to my colleague from Wyoming. I would like to inquire
as to his intentions to speak.
Mr. THOMAS. Madam President, my understanding was that I was going to
have 10 minutes, then we would go to Senator Conrad, and then the
Senator from Minnesota.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. It is correct that the Senator from Wyoming
has 10 minutes, to be followed by the Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. REID. I am sorry.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. REID. Is the consent agreement, as interpreted by the Chair, that
the two morning business matters will be completed prior to debate on
the motion to table? That seems a little unusual.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming is speaking on the
amendment for up to 10 minutes.
Mr. REID. I apologize.
Mr. DAYTON. I have asked unanimous consent that following the
conclusion of the remarks of the Senator from Wyoming, I might speak on
the amendment for 10 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. THOMAS. Madam President, I rise to discuss similarly what our
floor leader said a few moments ago in terms of this bill before us. We
are here to talk about the Defense appropriations. We have gone on now
for a couple of days focusing on this matter of uranium from Africa. It
seems to me that we need to focus on the issue that is before us and
that is supporting our troops where they are, the Defense
appropriations that we have, and probably the most important, certainly
the largest appropriations that is before us.
I have been listening now for some days and listening to the media,
the charge that the 16 words President Bush uttered during his January
State of the Union have been false. This is what he said:
The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from
Africa.
That is what was said. So we say this may be false because in fact
the British Government continues to stand by the assertion even if the
CIA does not. So what Mr. Bush said about what the British believed was
true in January, and it is still true today. That is what the British
believed.
Now do we need to take a look at our intelligence system? Of course,
that is very important to us. But anyone who thinks every piece of
intelligence is going to have certified truthfulness behind it, of
course, is being naive. Because that is not the way things work.
It is so clear this is so political that it really is kind of hard to
accept. In fact, there are ads out now, political ads, assailing the
President's credibility, and they go ahead and quote what the President
said. But interestingly enough, they leave off the words ``the British
government has learned.''
They leave those off. Doesn't this give you some feeling that we are
taking this a little more politically than we are anything else? It
seems to me that is the case. We are here now and this whole matter of
weapons of mass destruction is an issue we are all concerned about. But
this matter of uranium is not the reason we are in Iraq. Saddam Hussein
used chemical weapons on his own people, his neighbors. Clearly, the
production facilities were making chemical and biological weapons.
There is no question about that.
In September 1980, Iraq invaded Iran, and Iraq used chemical weapons.
In 1988, chemical weapons were used against Iraqi Kurdish, killing
5,000 Kurds. After Operation Desert Storm, February 18, 1991, in the
terms of the cease-fire, Iraq accepted the conditions of the U.N.
Security Council resolution. That resolution required Iraq to fully
disclose and permit the dismantling of the weapons of mass destruction.
That did not happen. That is why we are there.
This idea of leading us off the track because of the uranium is not
really the issue. Should we look at our intelligence system? Of course.
We do that constantly. But we don't need to take away the dollars that
are in this bill for those agencies while we take a look at it. There
is nothing more important in the world today than to have intelligence.
I just think we need to cut through some of the things that have been
going on here and we need to get down to what issues there are that
affect our defense and the American people and deal with those.
Politics is fine, but this is not the place to continuously
[[Page S9527]]
use items that are obviously just political and try to take away the
credibility of the President, which is one of his greatest assets, and
I understand that. I understand that we are in an election cycle and so
on. I really think it is time to deal with the important issues. We are
having hearings. I think we need to move on and deal with the issues
before us--to continue to clean up the situation in Iraq, look for
peaceful solutions. That is really what it is all about.
I will not take any more time. For a couple of days, I have been
listening to this constant recital of the same sort of thing. It seems
to me it is pretty clear where we are. We are in Iraq for a number of
reasons, this being a very slight impact on the decisionmaking. What we
are really intent on doing is getting on with these appropriations
bills, supporting our military, providing a strong military so we can
continue to do the things we have to do. But this idea of continuing to
try to contain an issue and make it something more than it really is
seems to me to be worn out.
I hope we can move forward. We have a lot to do. We need to deal with
the issues that are before us. I don't think this particular amendment
is useful. We already have a system for looking at this. Withholding
money pending a third-party operation simply doesn't make sense. I hope
we will table this amendment.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota is recognized.
Mr. DAYTON. I fully concur with my colleague that we need to conclude
our work on this bill. This is the third day we have been on this
matter. There are several hundred billion dollars involved; it is one
of the most costly measures we consider every year. The majority leader
said we will complete work on the bill tonight. I expect we will do so
with that instruction. I am prepared to stay late, as others of my
colleagues are, to talk about these issues. I cannot think of anything
that is more profoundly important to this country today and to the
future of this Nation and to the world today and to the future of the
world than what we are addressing, which is the circumstances that
caused the President of the United States to make, as my colleague from
Illinois said, an onerous and fateful decision to start a war, doing
something that was unprecedented in our Nation's history--to initiate a
war against another country, invade another country.
Now, there may be other reasons cited for doing so, but under
international law, under the U.N. Charter, of all the reasons cited by
the administration for this action, the one that has no credence is the
threat of an immediate and urgent attack against the United States by
weapons of mass destruction with the missile capability to deliver
them. That is what was stated and implied on a frequent basis by
members of the administration last fall.
This is not about one 16-word inclusion in the President's State of
the Union speech, as important as that is. This is about questions, as
the Senator from Illinois said, that dictated the actions or influenced
the actions of Congress last October in voting to give the President
the authority to initiate military action, which the President followed
through on 6 months later, for which we have 145,000 sweltering
Americans in Iraq today. I was there 2 weeks ago in 115-degree
temperatures. If anything, they are even hotter than that at this point
in time. Some of those incredibly brave young men and women won't come
home to their families and friends alive. They will give the ultimate
sacrifice on behalf of their country.
So these are profound matters. I commend my colleague from Illinois
for his careful choice of words and his reasoned approach to these
matters, in recognition of his position on the Senate Intelligence
Committee, his restraint in sharing only unclassified information to
support his amendment, which I am proud to support myself.
We have tried on this side of the aisle in the last days to strike
some bipartisan agreements about how to address matters of disclosure
of financial expenditures for this military undertaking. We talked with
the distinguished chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee about
where the money is in this bill for the purposes of the ongoing
military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The chairman informed us that 2 days ago, in the 2003 supplemental
appropriations, those funds were provided that are being drawn down for
the purpose of conducting these military operations in those two
countries and we should expect another supplemental appropriations
request to be forthcoming early in the next calendar year. That same
day, however, the comptroller for the Department of Defense was quoted
as saying there remains only $4 billion in that account. Given the
statement of the Secretary of Defense to our Senate Armed Services
Committee the week before that we are spending, on a monthly basis,
$4.8 billion in Iraq and Afghanistan combined, it is quite obvious that
that $4 billion is going to last them less than another month.
So we have tried and we have not been as successful as we should be
because it ought to be transparent to this body exactly what is being
spent, where it is being spent, and we ought to be appropriating, as
others have pointed out--Senator Byrd first and foremost among them--
that we ought to be doing this through proper channels.
Yesterday, as the Senator from Illinois said, we tried to get an
agreement for a bipartisan independent commission that would be
established and that would bring, it is my conception, the
distinguished senior Americans, those whose credibility and integrity
and experience and wisdom are unquestioned and would bring forth for
the benefit of this body, but most importantly for the benefit of all
the American people, what are the facts in these questions that have
been raised and how do they instruct us in terms of the veracity of our
intelligence information and the veracity of our political leaders.
Yesterday there was an editorial in the Washington Post which stated
just that. It said: ``Wait for the facts.'' It cited the President's
remarks in his State of the Union Address, the 16-word sentence that
has received so much attention. It went on to say:
If so, that would represent one of several instances in
which administration statements on Iraq were stretched to
reflect the most aggressive interpretation of the
intelligence.
That, I believe, is a carefully phrased way of saying what I said
earlier in my remarks. There were several times last fall when the
implication was made or the assertion was stated that these weapons of
mass destruction were not only developed but were poised to be used
against the United States and that they constituted an immediate and
urgent threat to our national security which, as I said before, both
under U.N. charter and international law, is the single legal basis for
the United States to invade another country: The threat of imminent
attack or the actual attack itself.
As the most powerful nation in the world, the one that has led the
way for over the last half century in not starting wars--finishing wars
successfully, but not starting them--for us to engage in now the first
of what the President has articulated as the doctrine of preemption,
where we will initiate those wars, we will attack first, in the
judgment of this Senator is a very unwise course which will dangerously
destabilize the world if it becomes the normal practice of nations,
other than the United States--and we have to expect it will--to launch
those kinds of attacks.
Last August, before the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Nashville, Vice
President Cheney said:
There's no doubt that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass
destruction.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in September in Atlanta said
that American intelligence had ``bulletproof'' evidence of links
between al-Qaida and the government of President Saddam Hussein of
Iraq.
In each case, officials have offered no details to back up those
assertions. Mr. Rumsfeld said today doing so would jeopardize the lives
of spies and dry up sources of information.
As was stated by a couple of my colleagues, we have to rely on this
hidden information which can be alluded to, to prove just about any
point anybody wants to make, but we cannot know the facts.
In October, the President himself made his argument, quoting an
article
[[Page S9528]]
in the Chicago Tribune, for invasion, emphasizing the notion Hussein
could strike the United States first and inflict ``massive and sudden
horror.''
Finally, Secretary Rumsfeld, again testifying before the Armed
Services Committee, said:
The United States must act quickly to save tens of
thousands of citizens.
I could go on with illustrations. My point is, we should let the
facts speak for themselves. We deserve to know the facts. We deserve
and must know, for the sake of our national security, whether the
information we received from intelligence agencies was accurate, and we
need to know for the sake of our democracy whether the representation
of those facts by our leaders was accurate.
That is the intent of the Durbin amendment. It is the reason it
should be approved by this body. It is the reason this body should do
what is right, which is to seek together to know the facts.
I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senator from
North Dakota is recognized.
Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I thank my colleagues for raising these
important issues. I am going to take the first few minutes of my 30
minutes to talk on what has been discussed this morning because I think
it is so important to the country, and then I will turn to another
subject.
I have not previously spoken on these issues on the floor because my
primary responsibility in the Senate is representing the State of North
Dakota, and I have special responsibility for budget issues in my
position as ranking member on the Budget Committee and as a senior
member of the Finance Committee for matters that relate to Social
Security and Medicare and the financing of the U.S. Government, and, of
course, in my role on the Agriculture Committee dealing with questions
of agricultural policy. I am not on the committees that deal with
foreign policy and defense policy.
All of us have a responsibility to speak out when we believe the
country is headed in a wrong direction. I believe the President is
taking us down a road that is fraught with real danger for the country.
The President asked this Congress--the Senate and the House--for
authority to launch a preemptive attack on another nation, an attack
before that country had attacked us or attacked any of our allies. In
fact, Iraq had not engaged in an attack on anyone for more than a
decade. The President told us and told the world that they, Iraq,
represented an immediate and imminent threat to America.
I personally believe there may be a place for preemptive attack in
protecting the American people. I believe if we have clear and
convincing evidence that a country represents an imminent threat to our
people, we have a right to act first, especially in a world where
weapons of mass destruction do exist, to prevent catastrophic loss to
our Nation.
When we launch a preemptive attack on another country, we had better
have it right. We had better make certain that what we are saying and
telling the world is correct. This President and this administration
told the world and told this Congress that Iraq had weapons of mass
destruction. There were many reasons to believe that statement, but now
the harsh reality is, those weapons of mass destruction have not been
found. This administration and this President told the Congress and
told the world that Iraq was trying to develop a nuclear capability,
and they gave as their best evidence that Iraq was seeking to buy
uranium from Niger. That has proved to be wrong.
The President told the world and told this Congress that there was a
clear connection to al-Qaida, and repeatedly we were told the best
evidence was there was a terrorist camp in Iraq training al-Qaida
operatives. Now we learn that camp was in a part of Iraq not controlled
by Saddam Hussein but controlled by the Kurds.
The day before yesterday, the President made the most astonishing
statement of all. In the Washington Post, the President is quoted as
saying that he attacked Iraq because Saddam Hussein would not permit
the U.N. weapons inspectors into the country.
I do not know if the President was misquoted. I have seen no attempt
to correct the record. I said nothing about this yesterday because I
hoped that the White House would say the President was misquoted. There
has been no attempt to correct the record.
We all know the weapons inspectors of the U.N. were in the country.
They were in Iraq. They were going site to site trying to determine if
there were weapons of mass destruction, trying to determine if there
was a nuclear program underway in that country. For the President to
now say he attacked Iraq because they would not permit inspectors
absolutely stands the facts on their head. The inspectors were there.
The reason the inspectors left is because we were threatening to attack
Iraq. So saying that Saddam Hussein did not permit inspectors in as a
rationale for war is mighty thin.
We have a fundamental problem of the credibility of the Nation. Our
country told the world a set of assertions, one after another, that
have proven to be wrong or have proven not to be demonstrably the case.
That puts our country's credibility at risk. When we are talking about
attacking other nations preemptively, as I said in the beginning, we
better make certain we have it right because if we start going around
the world attacking countries and cannot prove our assertions that they
represented an imminent threat to us, then I think America is in very
serious risk of alienating the world community. That is not in our
interest.
Mr. REID. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Mr. CONRAD. I am happy to yield.
Mr. REID. Senator Durbin had to go to an appropriations meeting, but
he asked that I relate to the Senate, and I will do it through the
Senator from North Dakota--is the Senator from North Dakota aware there
is a Web site the President has--I am sure the Senator is aware of
that; is that right?
Mr. CONRAD. Yes.
Mr. REID. Well, I am aware of the fact that there was a part of that
Web site that one can no longer get into. ``Behind the Scenes'' is what
it was entitled. I hold up in front of the Senator now something that
was on the Web site that one could go to, but one cannot anymore,
talking about how the President prepares the State of the Union
Message.
It says: Behind the Scenes, State of the Union preparation.
And it shows the President with his hands out there. It shows the
President going over his speech word by word.
Under this, it says: While working at his desk in the Oval Office,
President Bush reviews the State of the Union address line-by-line,
word-by-word.
I want the Senator from North Dakota to know that Senator Durbin--
this is on his behalf but certainly I underline and underscore what he
wanted to be printed in the Record--we are to a point that the Senator
from North Dakota said we are. It is the credibility of not necessarily
going to war in Iraq, which is certainly part of it, but the
credibility of this country in the world. Can the United States of
America, the great country that it is--can people depend on the word of
the President of the United States? And certainly in that they have
taken this off the Web site, it indicates that there is certainly a
problem with the President going over his speech word-by-word, line-by-
line.
Mr. CONRAD. I say to the Senator, I have not said anything for weeks
on this issue, but with each passing day I become more concerned about
the credibility of our Nation. When a policy is announced of preemptive
strike, something we have never done before in our country's history--I
remember going to grade school and being taught that America never
attacked first, but if somebody attacked us, we countered and we always
won. That was what we were taught growing up. I was proud of it. I was
proud that America never attacked first.
Now the world has changed. I would be the first to acknowledge the
world has changed. I can see a role for preemptive strike in a world
where weapons of mass destruction do exist in order to prevent
catastrophic loss to this country. But we better be very certain before
we launch an attack on another nation that that attack is justified and
that, in fact, that nation represents an imminent threat because, if we
start attacking nations and we cannot prove our assertions, very
quickly
[[Page S9529]]
the rest of the world is going to doubt our word, our credibility, and
our basic goodness as a nation. Now, that is serious business.
The fact is, this administration told the world Iraq had weapons of
mass destruction; that they were trying to develop nuclear capability;
that there was a connection to al-Qaida. Each and every one of those
claims now is in question. It is not just 16 words in the State of the
Union. It is far more serious than that.
For the President, the day before yesterday, to compound it by saying
he attacked Saddam Hussein because he did not permit U.N. weapons
inspectors in that country is false on its face. We all know the
weapons inspectors were there. We all know they were going site to site
trying to find weapons of mass destruction. The question of whether or
not they were effective or not is another question but to assert to the
world that we attacked Iraq because there were not inspectors there, I
am afraid it makes us look as though we are not very careful with our
claims.
(The further remarks of Mr. Conrad are printed in today's Record
under ``Morning Business.'')
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, what is the business before the Senate?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Durbin amendment is before us.
Mr. KENNEDY. I ask unanimous consent that it be temporarily laid
aside so that my amendment will be in order.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
[...]
Vote On Amendment No. 1277
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to
table the Durbin amendment No. 1277. The yeas and nays have been
ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham), the
Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Connecticut
(Mr. Lieberman), and the Senator from Georgia (Mr. Miller) are
necessarily absent.
I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from
Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``no.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 62, nays 34, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 287 Leg.]
YEAS--62
Alexander
Allard
Allen
Bayh
Bennett
Biden
Bond
Brownback
Bunning
Burns
Campbell
Carper
Chafee
Chambliss
Cochran
Coleman
Collins
Conrad
Cornyn
Craig
Crapo
DeWine
Dodd
Dole
Domenici
Dorgan
Edwards
Ensign
Enzi
Fitzgerald
Frist
Graham (SC)
Grassley
Gregg
Hagel
Hatch
Hutchison
Inhofe
Inouye
Kyl
Lincoln
Lott
Lugar
McCain
McConnell
Murkowski
Nelson (NE)
Nickles
Roberts
Santorum
Sessions
Shelby
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stabenow
Stevens
Sununu
Talent
Thomas
Voinovich
Warner
NAYS--34
Akaka
Baucus
Bingaman
Boxer
Breaux
Byrd
Cantwell
Clinton
Corzine
Daschle
Dayton
Durbin
Feingold
Feinstein
Harkin
Hollings
Jeffords
Johnson
Kennedy
Kohl
Landrieu
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Mikulski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Pryor
Reed
Reid
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Schumer
Wyden
NOT VOTING--4
Graham (FL)
Kerry
Lieberman
Miller
The motion was agreed to.
____________________